


There will be dancing

by sonictrowel



Series: Long Night in the Blue House [38]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005), Doctor Who (Big Finish Audio)
Genre: Domestic Fluff, F/M, Fluff and Smut, Light Angst, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-08
Updated: 2017-05-08
Packaged: 2018-10-29 14:39:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,741
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10856082
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sonictrowel/pseuds/sonictrowel
Summary: They did end up going to their usual place that night.  Flirting over a candlelit dinner with the Doctor, watching that delighted wicked grin spread across his face and the affection and want sparkle in his eyes as his hand reached for hers across the table— that would never get old, not if she had a hundred thousand years.  River tucked that thought away before the longing could start to choke her and focussed on enjoying this particular evening with him.  One at a time.





	There will be dancing

[Darillium]

Seven years left.  The single digits were hard.  Not counting down, not letting the dread overtake them was hard.  So they had started beginning each morning and ending each night with a meditation, of sorts, to keep their anxieties at bay.  

River woke first one morning, sitting up with a start.  She put her hand to her forehead, trying to settle her breathing and remember where and when she was.  In her dream, it had been morning.  Real morning.  But their room was still dark, and the Doctor was still fast asleep beside her.  She ran her fingers gently through his hair, shining silver in the cool starlight.  Her eyes roamed over his peaceful, relaxed face, the slightest little curve of a contented smile on his lips.  Her own heart was quietly racing.

It wasn’t long before he began to stir and smiled blearily up at her.  The smile she offered in return felt tight and strained.  The Doctor noticed, of course; alert and attentive only moments after waking.  He sat up beside her and, without a word, took her face in his hands and kissed her softly.  His mind flooded into hers: love and devotion and calm and _it’s okay, I’ve got you._  One of his hands moved to the back of her head, fingers tangling in her hair.  

Relief washed over River as she melted into the warmth of his kiss and the comfort of his thoughts joining with hers.  She hoped that, despite her anxiety, their ritual helped in both directions.  It seemed like it did.  Letting their minds mingle together grounded them here and now, offering each other the deep reassurance that came with being so intimately linked.  Offering each other a reminder that they still had years of this left, years to be together, and wouldn’t let a minute of it go to waste.

There was no getting back to sleep, so they headed for the shower.  The Doctor held her close under the streaming water, soap-slicked skin gliding together while he tucked his chin over her shoulder and wrapped her in his arms.  She let out a happy sigh and hugged him tight.

When they’d rinsed clean he bent his head to kiss her neck, and then her collarbone and her shoulder and her chest, his hands firmly holding her hips.

“Let’s go out tonight,” he murmured against her skin, his low voice reverberating off of the tile.

“Alright,” River said, a contented smile spreading over her face as she combed through her conditioner-slicked curls with her fingers.

“Where do you want to go?” he asked, his lips brushing over the swell of her breast as he spoke.

“Um,” she said, articulately, her hands slowing to a stop in her hair.

“Could do the usual,” he continued, the tip of his tongue slipping out to swirl teasingly around her nipple.

“Could do,” she replied breathlessly, not really paying any attention to what either of them was saying.

“I do love dancing with you,” he murmured, sounding equal parts earnest and suggestive, and then finally he was kissing and nibbling and sucking until jolts of pleasure were shooting through her body.  River made some sort of embarrassing noise in lieu of a response.

“Or we could go to that pho place,” the Doctor mused, his lips and tongue tracing over her skin between his words as he moved his mouth to her other breast.  “Good for a cold day.”  His lips locked onto her as his hand on her hip slid lower, long fingers dancing teasingly between her thighs before two of them delved into her.

River gasped and clung to him, her slippery hands trying to find purchase around his shoulders as he curled his fingers inside her, pressing just in the right spot with the right pressure to make her knees weak.

The Doctor stood up fully, taking on some of her weight between the arm he wrapped around her back and the hand that was curled between her thighs.  He put his lips to her ear, and she could hear the affection _and_ the smug smile in his voice.  

“Anything you like, dear,” he said; a low, promising rumble, his fingers thrusting and curling inside her.

River groaned and he chuckled.

“Oh, don’t be so self-satisfied,” she managed to gasp out, in between soft, shuddering whimpers she couldn’t suppress.

“Hmm.”  His face tilted nearer to her neck, making her shiver when he spoke.  “Maybe I’m doing something wrong, wasn’t _me_ I was trying to satisfy… although, the two do go hand in hand.”  He began to move his palm flat against her, sending a firm jolt through her clit each time his fingers moved.

“Smug— bastard,” River panted.  “I’ll— get you back.”

“Oh, no,” the Doctor said, voice tinged with amusement.  “That sounds terrible.  Definitely don’t want you to do that.”  

He kissed her neck and her cheek and then her lips, his palm steadily pushing against her clit in time with the firm pressure of his fingers.  River moaned desperately into his soft kisses; the gentle warmth of his open lips on hers contrasting deliciously with deep intensity of the heat he was stoking inside her, so strong it was _almost_ too much.  

She cried out and shook as the pleasure overtook her, tearing her mouth away from the Doctor’s to bury her face in his shoulder and hanging onto him for dear life, her legs trembling with the force of her release.  But he had her firmly and safely in his grasp, pressed tight against him.  

He held her while she caught her breath; whispered that he loved her while he helped rinse her hair.  He kissed her, deep and slow, while she leaned back against the tile and steadied her legs.  Through the dazzling haze of bliss and the thundering of her heart, the intoxicating tender warmth of his mouth on hers and the love pouring from his mind, strengthened by every point of contact, River managed to collect a thought.  

_Her turn._

She turned off the shower and pulled the Doctor after her by the hand.  Between giggling and teasing and kissing and clinging to each other, they managed to mostly dry off.  River led him to the bed, instructing him to lie on his back.  He raised an eyebrow as he dropped his towel before lying down.

She climbed onto the bed and crawled over him, straddling him and feeling his body instantly react to hers, pressed hard against her inner thigh.  His dark eyes followed her as she reached into the bedside drawer for one of his bow ties.

“Hands above your head,” she commanded, and he swallowed visibly as he silently complied.  “Now,” she purred, deliberately leaning her breasts over his face as she reached up to the headboard and carefully tied his wrists, “hold still and be good.”

“Yes, dear,” he said, his voice raspy and low.

___

 

They did end up going to their usual place that night.  Flirting over a candlelit dinner with the Doctor, watching that delighted wicked grin spread across his face and the affection and want sparkle in his eyes as his hand reached for hers across the table— that would never get old, not if she had a hundred thousand years.  River tucked that thought away before the longing could start to choke her and focussed on enjoying this particular evening with him.  One at a time.

They hadn’t been paying the band setting up any mind as they ate and talked, but when four rhythmic strikes of claves sounded from the stage, they looked up just in time to see the trumpet and piano players join in with the trio of percussionists.

“Oh, is it Cuban night?” River said, glancing back at the Doctor with a smile.  His expression was a little too pleased and amused for comfort.

“What?” she asked, laughing.

“Oh, nothing,” he replied, still smiling like the cat that caught the canary, and he stood as he took her hand.  She laughed again and shook her head as she followed him out onto the floor.

River quirked an eyebrow as he raised their joined hands and held her just under her arm with the other, while she placed hers on his shoulder.

“Don’t tell me you know the rumba?” she asked, trying to hide how impressed she was as he joined right into the box step with her.  He was already looking insufferably smug.  No matter if it was an adorable look on him.  Everything was, after all.

He shrugged.  Insufferable.

“Does that really just come with the regeneration lottery?”

“Nope,” he said happily.  “Tell you a spoiler?”

River blinked in surprise.  “Should you?”  He didn’t normally look so pleased about spoilers, these days.

“Don’t really think it can hurt,” he said, his smile turning more fond than smug.

“Alright."

“You taught me.”

 _“Did I?_  I don’t remember — wait, how could that be a spoiler?”

He shrugged, still smiling.

“Do you mean — I haven’t yet?”  Her heart started to race at the thought.

“It was a _long_ time ago,” he said, his eyes locking meaningfully onto hers.  “A _really_ long time.”

“I see,” she said, feeling a new little flutter of hope settle itself in her heart.

“I didn’t forget, though— I just didn’t know it was you.  Figured it out recently.”

“Oh?  And who did you think it was?”

“Rita Hayworth.”

River burst out laughing.  “Works for me.  How’d I pull that one off?”

The Doctor shrugged again.  “Spoilers.”

“Well,” she said, a little breathlessly.  “Something to look forward to.”  It wasn’t lost on River that it was only for _her_ to look forward to, but she didn’t see any pain in his smile at the moment.  He was just beaming at her, looking thrilled to have made her happy.

“Not that I’m not impressed,” she said finally, “but I don’t much like the rumba at the moment.  You’re too far away.”

“What, haven’t you already had enough of me today, Dr. Song?” he teased.

“Never,” she said softly.

He slid the hand that was under her arm around her back and pulled her into him, and kissed her with no regard for the other couples dancing around them.  River sighed through her nose and held him tight.  There was a future for her with him, however small it might be.  Even if he didn’t know her yet, at least there’d be dancing.

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed, lovely readers! The plot is all really moving into the flash-forwards now, but I won't leave the last years on Darillium unwritten :)


End file.
